Your endless joy I see,
a spread out peacock tail of the world –
bottomless glory, bottomless exquisiteness of beauty.

.

When I get up in the morning,
the demons sway back,
trees on a hill under the rush of wind
in the church of days.

.

One Sunday morning, between the shadow
and the light, I stood upright for a while.
It was in the hills.

.

The man up to his waist in the evening sea
is a centaur.
Light.

.

When I was holding my helmet most raised,
my head – highest,
then I took it off.

Author’s Statement on Beauty

We see beauty because we love the world. We put our souls’ beauty in it, and it reflects that love back to us. “We” are humans, as well as other animals. Goats on island cliffs contemplate the sea with a self-assuredness that is the equal of any great poet’s. They are the artists of what they see. And falcons, they embody beauty because they haven’t the time to passively look. They perform art as they fly, superbly appreciating its esthetic valor.

Margarita Serafimova has published one book of poetry, Animals and Other Gods, in the Bulgarian (Sofia University Press, 2016). Her second book, Demons and World, also in the Bulgarian, is forthcoming in March 2017 (Black Flamingo Publishing, Sofia).